Friday, 13 June 2014

Fitness favouritism

I've mentioned before about my pet hates in the gym and the etiquette most people follow.

Recently I've rediscovered my love for spinning and have attended a few classes. I'm actually hoping to get back into my old routine of 3 classes a week.

Last night reminded me of 2 things.

1. The power of the instructor and music and their influence on your class experience

2. Gym posers still exist

It's fair to say I am quite a creature of habit and nobody will agree moreso than my partner when it comes to spinning!

He already got a telling off last night for just picking any old bike, after strict instructions to 'test them out' first.

Anybody whose done spin before will get my point, particularly in Fitness First Romford where it's often a case of bike roulette in the studio.

You want to make sure you haven't got:

A wobbly bike

A bike where the resistance doesn't adjust properly

A bike where the pedal straps don't tighten or stay done up

A bike where any of the height adjusters are too tight to change

All of these points can make your class painful, frustrating or even cause injury.

Anyway, being an old 'veteran' of the classes I knew Thursday nights were run by a lady called Carmel. But as I got into the studio, met by my fiancé standing next to a wobbly bike (god forbid!) I realised there was a cover teacher.

Sometimes this can be a good thing as they challenge you more and teach you new routines.

To be fair this teacher did that. However, until quite near the end I found the class painful and admittedly rather boring.

The music in the main wasn't my sort of thing and it was so quiet. The instructor was very mumbled and so you couldn't really tell what she was saying. She also had this rather interesting approach to getting us to a standing position on the bike - whistling at us like herding some sheep (a reference I owe to my partner!)

Yet again my taking things a bit too far approach kicked in as I also found it annoying the way she kept referring to adding a gear. Most instructors refer to 'turns' and you add either a full turn, quarter or half.

Safe to say I wasn't overwhelmed by the experience and am hoping the regular lady is back next time.

The difference compared to the recent two classes I've done was huge. My legs didn't seem to want to go very fast at all, I found myself tiring more quickly and I seemed to take a long time to feel the effects in the right places (with other classes I can feel the ache in my quads, abs, arms etc straightaway).

As for the gym posers, well, I'll come back to them in another post - they need a blog of their own!

The class last night made me think though.

Do you get more out a class where you know the instructor and their methods?

Do you actually hold positions in the correct way if you know the teacher? And as a result get more benefit?

Or is a 'stranger' key to giving your body a shock and actually working different muscles and working you harder?

Should you in fact go to other classes to break habit and stop your body getting too used to things?

I'd love to know your thoughts, whether you go spinning or classes, or just generally are into fitness in some way.